As an entrepreneur you must be able to see what others don’t—to see an unmet need and meet it, to see a heretofore unsolved problem and solve it. When we think of problems to be solved and needs to be met, perhaps nowhere are these conditions more rampant than in today’s music industry. While the problems seem daunting, every day, someone comes up with new businesses designed to market, promote, and sell music.

It is crucial that you think like an entrepreneur in today’s music world. The better an artist can do this, the better he can take an active role in guiding his career and allowing those songs to reach the widest-possible audience.

As the economist Ludwig Lachman stated, “The future is unknowable, but not unimaginable." Times of great turmoil represent times of great opportunity. The record industry is in great turmoil; it is a day and a time for the entrepreneur—for those who can imagine a better way—now more than ever.

To get started, check out this interview with one of the greatest music entrepreneurs ever, Chris Blackwell. Mr. Blackwell founded Island Records, and was responsible for the careers of — among others — Bob Marley and U2. His words should inspire you to get started.

If you need further encouragement to believe that right now is the time for the entrepreneur, check out former-RCA head Bob Jamieson’s discussion on this topic.

One thing that keeps people from taking the entrepreneurial plunge is lack of confidence. Dave Neupert, founder of M80 Marketing addresses this issue, as well as offers up some great advice for finding a hole in the market and filling it.

In the following video, I discuss why musicians actually tend to have a surprising number of innate entrepreneurial skills.

In order to succeed as an entrepreneur you must both know the problems that are out there and the solutions you might offer. Todd Brabec, Executive Vice President of ASCAP, talks about the importance of understanding the landscape, and offers some very tangible advice on how to get started as an entrepreneur in this video.
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To sum it up, as Prof. Ken Lopez says in the following video, entrepreneurship is “almost everything.”

These videos represent only a portion of the material on entrepreneurship you can find on AHM. For more, type ‘entrepreneurship' in the search box in the upper right hand corner of every page.